Ebravil has been sitting on a time bomb since the joyous days of the War of Liberation ninety years ago.

After the Great Plague sixty years ago and the outbreak at [CENSORED] hab-block thirty years ago [File Ref: Eb/Barb/M39.778/P325] it became clear to the Inquisition that something foul and spiteful had remained buried even after the forces of the Great Enemy were scoured from the face of the planet. Investigations after the incident thirty years ago identified the presence of a daemon, Barbatus (class. Malleus Extremis), thought to have been exterminated on two previous occasions. It has, once again, returned.

Despite your team’s best efforts Barbatus has arisen and a plague has swept through Ebravil, putrefying the flesh of all it touches and withering them in clouds of rot flies. The dead walk the streets, the dying wait to join them. An orbital bombardment from your ships in orbit have given you some breathing space, although the collateral damage is impeding your team’s efforts to move about the city. You must reach the shielded Arbites Precincthouse in the Lantern Quarter, from where you can plan your next move.

That was the briefing for the Inquisition player in Tuesday’s game – “City Of The Dead”. I wrote some rules for Plague Zombies and a Plague Lord, which worked pretty well. There were dozens of zombies on the table at one point, although I don’t think we ever used all of the 71(!) Gary had painted.

Memorable moments included an acolyte being shot and badly wounded by the Plague Lord. Pinned and with a wounded leg, he turned to see his colleagues run away and leave him to die. Six zombies plus the Plague Lord closed in on him – and in an astonishing display of Imperial might he killed one zombie, managed to break off from the combat and just managed to make it into a nearby crashed Chimera – which he managed to repair! Sadly, a zombie had wounded him as he broke off, meaning that soon, the warp would take his soul…

But not before he drove over some zombies in a Chimera!

As you can see from the pictures, I used the cardstock terrain as well as other ruins to represent the freshly bombed city of Ebravil (and if you’ve read Killing Time, then it is indeed the same city and the same daemon). It represented a Mechanicus facility, but overall I am not impressed with cardstock terrain. It feels too insubstantial and looks – bendy.

So this is my proposed solution. Cut all the tabs and other bits off, and glue the remaining walls and floors and so on to pieces of black foamcore. Here’s my test piece I did tonight:-

I much prefer this. It is much sturdier and probably much more durable. It also looks much better, and is not that much harder to make. I cut the wall corners at 45 degrees, but for future pieces I will just butt them together and overlap the card to hide the join. That will be stronger and better looking, and easier to make.

Turns out PVA glue is good for sticking foamcore to itself, while the normal scrapbookers’ glue I used for the cardstock is best for sticking the card to the foamcore.

The other thing I can do with the foamcore backed pieces is make them modular:-

I used the card template to cut notches in the base. With matching notches in all the other pieces, I can use little foamcore pieces to hold them securely. That’s the idea, anyway.

I had quite a few misgivings about trying cardstock terrain, but seeing a friend’s efforts finally persuaded me to give it a try.

If you don’t know what it is, cardstock terrain is terrain printed (at home, or on your work printer if your boss isn’t around) on thick card. PDFs are purchased and downloaded from a variety of sites. The main benefits of cardstock terrain are that it is very low cost (printer ink and card are the main consumables) and that if you break something, sit on it or just decide you want more (and more and more) you can print more off. It is also easily modifiable.

I started with the Firstlight kit from World Works Games, which comes in at $17 (a colonial currency – about £10 in real money )

What you see here is the product of two night’s work. Once you get the hang of printing properly (ie. best quality and no page scaling) and cutting the pieces out, assembly can actually be very quick. My top tip is to use your ruler to cut the edges of printed sections, and just freehand the tabs. Given the number of tabs, freehanding them saves a lot of time.

In terms of tools, this is all you need:-

The obvious ones (and the ones you probably already have) are the cutting mat, the steel ruler with cork backing and an el cheapo cutting tool. For cutting, make sure the blade is kept fresh, as results are quicker and better with a sharp edge. For the glue you want something that dries fast, does not distort the card and is easy to apply. I picked this glue up at John Lewis, but any stationers will have it. It does everything I want. The other must-have is kirby grips (not sure what name they are known by outside the UK). These are tailor made for holding your tabs and corners together while the glue sets up. Get some – £1 from Asda.

When this is finished, I plan to use it in my games of 40k (and Throne Agent!) as a hi-tech lab or a bunker compound or a crashed cargo ship (etc etc). No doubt it would work for Space Hulk, too.

Once it is done I will post up completed pics.

We are starting to get into our stride with playing/ testing Throne Agent!, and got another good game in yesterday. Here are some photos and highlights.

(EDIT: and, per Suneokun, a list of the combatants)

Hounds of Zhufor – A Chaos Warband

Quarr the Bloodrender (Leader)
Slaught, Hound of Xaphan (counts as Cyber Mastiff)
Magos Darmalian Fract (counts as Interrogator)
Servo Skull (stays with Fract)
Braxus Spect (Forces Veteran)
G for Grinder (Mutant)
Maledict Strange (Unsanctioned Psyker)
Oberunt The Worm (Penitent)
Varlak the Bloated (Priest of Nurgle)

Khabala’s Illustrious Warband

Inquisitor Malefoso Khabala
Interrogator Anastasio Laudro (Psyker)
Explicator Gabriel Vincento
Pariah the Shrivening (with Box) (Bound Psyker)
Forces Veteran ‘Papa’ Luigi Brutelus
Forces Veteran Henargus Rench
Forces Veteran Warret Lamarr
Torturer Doctor Lambretto Tease
Excoriator Tenchy Hrunk
Four inducted PDF troopers (their names will be recorded should their deeds warrant same)

The mission was a GM’d scenario for two players. An ancient ruin lies at the centre of the table, containing two rooms, one large and one small. At some point in the next six rounds, an dark ritual will be completed and a daemon will be summoned. The heretic’s band is there to bind the daemon, the inquisitor’s is there to destroy it.

Secondary objectives (some of which only came up during play as events unfolded) included occupying the larger of the ruin’s two rooms, opening and reading a strange scroll and capturing and interrogating a member of the opposing force. In addition, powerful sand storms scoured the valley of the ruins, meaning that dangerous whirlwinds might (and did!) appear at random throughout the game.

Both teams deployed 6″ in on opposite sides, although the heretics were allowed to start with one model in the large room of the ancient ruin. It seemed only fitting that the leader, Quarr the Bloodrender, Chosen of Zhufor, would select that honour. You cannot see him in this shot, but he’s inside that central building.

After the last game, my team had spent some of their experience points, thus increasing their total points cost. The forces of the Imperium, who had not earned as many XP (despite earning a draw in that last game), got to induct some local PDF troopers to make up the difference. They are the Steel Legion soldiers in the bottom of the picture (the one who is lying down is just crouching – small target and +1 to his cover save).

Quarr was a bit concerned that the hated Inquisition would be on him quickly, storming the central ruin and taking tactical control of the confrontation. He ordered his mind-slaved puppet, Magos Dharmalian Fract to race to his side, both to ensure that Fract could take wounds for Quarr (which he can do if within 3″) and to have a look at that odd disappearing casket in the small room of the ruin. Quarr held the onrushing forces of the Corpse God at bay with a well-thrown frag grenade, following up with a shot from his plasma pistol that burned one of the psyker witches in blue flames. This was handy, because she had been about to unleash the power of the machine god and wreck his treasured plasma pistol for D3 Turns.

Quarr sent his favourite Hound of Xaphan, Slaught, to charge at the masked Inquisitor Khabala and his Explicator Gabriel Vincento and keep them at bay. Slaught managed to disembowel The Shrivening (another pskyer) before Malafoso scorched his bones to dust, but the job was done and neither the Inquisitor nor his Explicator made it into the central ruin all game.

Varlak the Bloated proved his worth as a superb support character, hurling tear-gas grenades every turn (as he is a Nurgle priest, this seems only fitting – although we call them blight grenades instead) and so providing valuable mobile cover to the charging G for Grinder.

G for Grinder (a Forgeworld Renegade Ogryn boss) has to be one of my favourite models of all time. He didn’t do well last game, so I was hoping he would restore my faith. Oh, yes! Despite an early flaming he charged and killed one of the Inquisition’s combat veterans, but was left in the open. Six separate enemy models drew back and lined up to fire. Seeing his plight, Varlak hurled a blight grenade right at G for Grinder, scoring a hit. The raging Ogryn was safe from the effects of the gas thanks to his respirator (all of Quarr’s team have them) but none of the enemy could see him any more! Next Turn he charged out of the cloud, tore another veteran off a wall and then rampaged off after Inquisitor Malafoso, severely wounding him and forcing him to fall back. What a guy!

Meanwhile, Magos Fract opened and read the ancient scroll, learning powerful lore on how to bind the deamon, but before he could pass this information on (via the team’s comm net), one of Malafoso’s men leapt on him from atop the ruins and rendered him unconscious. The unsanctioned psyker, Maledict Strange, then used the power of his diseased mind to choke the assailant (Pinning him for 3 Turns) and managed to revive Magos Fract.

Elsewhere, Quarr himself was keeping his men in line, providing them with re-rolls on leadership checks through sheer force of personality (Dark Charisma skill), while also finding time to restrain and torture another of the Imperial lackeys, managing to learn the identity of the masked inquisitor.

Towards the end of the game the daemon appeared. Quarr and his servants had the ruins pretty well secured by now, but with only 10 wounds, a 5+ save and a penchant for attacking the nearest character on either side, the daemon might be killed at any moment. Quarr used his Fast Talk skill to convince the daemon he was not its enemy, thus persuading it (temporarily) not to attack his team, before launching himself at it and grappling with it. Although the daemon managed to break free and attack the unlucky Oberunt the Worm, the mysterious Maledict Strange hurled himself into the fray and successfully bound the daemon with the very last dice roll of the game!

Result: Complete victory to the forces of darkness! The ruinous powers favoured their most brutal of servants this day, and the brazen dogs of Inquisitor Malafoso were forced to run away and lick their wounds.

Sadly, Slaught did not recover from his wounds and died (there is a post-game table for characters who go below -10 wounds, and I got unlucky with my rolling). My comms operator Braxus Spect joined him on the charnel-pile, but all Quarr said was, “So? The Blood God has his due. Send me more meat!”

I got plenty of XP from that game, so my guys will have a few new skills and cunning tricks up their sleeve the next time the dark gods send for them

I mentioned before that a friend has written up a set of rules for what is effectively Kill Team crossed with Inquisitor, which he calls Throne Agent! (the exclamation mark is part of the title). Basically, each player has a crack Inquisitorial, Xenos or Heretic team of 200 points (to begin with), and gameplay is very narratively focused, with a GM calling the shots. Characters (models) gain experience/ skills/ injuries that persist from game to game. On Saturday we played a variation where no GM was required, and the mission worked so well I thought I would mention it here, as it would work just as well in 40k.

Warhammer 40k Mission – Plant the Beacons

Each team is equipped with networked beacons that they must set in place somewhere on the tabletop. For a heretic team, the beacons might be warp generators to cause a massive warp breach. For a inquisitorial team the beacons might be warp nullifiers, or even teleport homers to enable the Grey Knights to deep-strike accurately, and so on.

Set-up: Roll for deployment type. Then roll a D3+2. This is how many beacons each team has (they both have the same). Each beacon must be given to a single non-vehicle unit during deployment – use a suitable model, token or dice to represent the beacon. The unit in question may be held in reserve.

Scoring: At the end of the game, each player measures the distance between his surviving beacons (a surviving beacon is one that has not been destroyed or deactivated) and the next nearest surviving beacon. Measure once for each surviving beacon and add up each player’s score as follows:-

0″-6″ – beacons too close, causing interference. No points
6″-12″ – 1 point
12″ – 18″ – 2 points
18″ – 24″ – 4 points
>24″ – beacons out of range. No points.

Beacons: Any model in the unit can carry the beacon – place the beacon in base to base contact with that model. It may not be passed around within the unit unless it is put down and picked up again. Treat the model carrying the beacon as having a unique piece of wargear for wound allocation purposes. No unit can have more than one beacon at any time (eg. an IC carrying one cannot join a unit also carrying one). The beacon cannot be directly affected by enemy action (eg. shooting, assault, psychic powers etc) unless it is dropped or the model holding it is killed. A model can set down a beacon at any time (and must set it down if killed), or pick up a beacon simply by moving a model into base to base contact with it. If the model carrying the beacon is not killed but is otherwise removed from play (eg. by Jaws of the World Wolf or Falls Back off the table edge) the beacon is lost.

Deactivating A Beacon: Any non-vehicle model can deactivate an enemy beacon by moving into base to base contact with it. A deactivated beacon can be re-activated by the controlling player by moving a non-vehicle model into base to base contact with it.

Destroying A Beacon: A beacon is treated as having T3 and any wounding hit will destroy it. It may gain a cover save in the usual way. Remember that a beacon can only be targeted if dropped.

I hope the effect of the beacons on strategy is fairly clear. The player must spread out with his forces to maximise his score, but must also guard against a central beacon being destroyed and thus isolating others, crippling his score. He must also try and prevent the enemy from scoring highly.

If anyone does try this in a game of 40k, let me know how it goes. It worked very well in Throne Agent! although the core gameplay is very different (inc. no transports, reserves from any table edge and each model operates independantly).

The orks have sold well and, in addition to making enough to purchase Mrs Sholto a pair of Ugg boots, it is time to heed the call of Forgeworld and return to the land of resin.

I made my last Forgeworld bulk purchase about 8 months ago, and have managed to get it (almost) all painted now. So, time for another one

The call of Chaos is a strong one, and they were the first army I ever owned for 40k. That fact, combined with the new 40k game Throne Agent! we have been playing recently (think 30mm Inquisitor team action game), has led me to purchase a fine-looking heretic insurgency team:-

My last purchase was all multiple identical units, and mostly vehicles. The ones that were not vehicles were still very large models. What I am looking forward to with this one is that all the models are small and each one is unique. Painting these is going to be a joy Coming up with backstories for them all perhaps even more so!